


Flashes and Phosphenes

by natsinator



Series: as in a mirror, dimly [8]
Category: Ginga Eiyuu Densetsu | Legend of the Galactic Heroes
Genre: Canon Compliant, Gen, More Mittermeyer Depression Content, Post-Canon, quelle surprise: i’m writing about the same themes of ‘what is the truth’ that i always am
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-02
Updated: 2020-11-02
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:40:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,257
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27351358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/natsinator/pseuds/natsinator
Summary: “Thirty-three,” Mittermeyer said, raising his glass. “Prosit!”“Don’t remind me,” Felix said, but he drank all the same.“If you’re complaining about getting old, I don’t know what you think that I’m doing,” Mittermeyer said. “Being twice your age and all.”“Well, it’s the duty of a father to grow old before their son, isn’t it?”
Relationships: Past Relationships Implied
Series: as in a mirror, dimly [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1997422
Comments: 2
Kudos: 16
Collections: Tofis Fave Reads





	Flashes and Phosphenes

Mittermeyer knocked on the office door in the Ministry of War, holding a wrapped box tightly beneath his arm. 

“Come in,” Felix called, and Mittermeyer pushed the door open.

His son didn’t look up for a second, until Mittermeyer clicked the door closed behind him, but when he did, his face broke out into an easy smile, and he stood, saluting. Felix was quite tall, and the spitting image of his father. It was only the fact that Reuenthal had never worn this style of admiral uniform that grounded Mittermeyer in the present when he looked at him.

Mittermeyer smiled back. “Came to wish you a happy birthday before you headed out,” he said.

“Hah, I had hoped everyone would forget,” Felix said. Mittermeyer wandered over to the front of the heavy wooden desk and took a seat in the chair there, while Felix turned half around. “Can I offer you a drink?”

“Just one,” Mittermeyer said. “Though perhaps I should reprimand you for drinking on duty.”

Felix laughed. He poured two glasses of whiskey and set one down in front of Mittermeyer.

“Thirty-three,” Mittermeyer said, raising his glass. “Prosit!”

“Don’t remind me,” Felix said, but he drank all the same. 

“If you’re complaining about getting old, I don’t know what you think that I’m doing,” Mittermeyer said. “Being twice your age and all.”

“Well, it’s the duty of a father to grow old before their son, isn’t it?” Felix said.

Mittermeyer smiled, though it was the same bittersweet feeling that rose up in him whenever Felix made some passing reference to him as his father. Certainly, Mittermeyer loved Felix as his son, but when he thought of Felix’s father, it was not himself he was thinking of. “I’m glad I haven’t shirked that duty,” Mittermeyer said.

“I sometimes suspect that you will outlive me,” Felix said.

There wasn’t anything that Mittermeyer could say to that. The two responses he considered in that moment, “It’s a father’s duty to die before his son, as well,” and “I certainly hope not,” seemed both too morbid and wrong. Instead, he just picked up the box that was on his lap and handed it to Felix. “Got you a little something,” he said.

Felix hefted the box. “Let me guess: a puppy.”

“Just open it,” Mittermeyer said. The smirk on Felix’s face indicated he knew exactly what was in the box, but he pulled open the paper fastidiously, then lifted the lid of the wooden box. Its purple velvet lined interior held two ornate silver dueling pistols.

“You’re never going to stop hanging this over me, are you?”

“If you’re wondering if they work, they don’t,” Mittermeyer said. “Decoration only.”

Felix shook his head, though he was smiling still. 

The one time that Mittermeyer had ever, truly, lost his temper at his son was when he had been twenty, a senior in the Imperial Officers’ Academy, and he had challenged another student to a duel. Mittermeyer had heard about this and had unloaded the full force of his parental fears onto Felix, starting with, “Do you know what that kind of behavior looks like?!” going into, “Are you trying to break your mother’s heart?!” and ending somewhere around, “Your life is not a toy, or a game, to be played with and thrown away!” 

Felix had been appropriately contrite, and the incident had never been repeated. For his next birthday, as something of an apology for how viciously Mittermeyer had yelled, and something of a visual reminder not to duel, Mittermeyer bought his son a non-functional pair of antique pistols. He now had a good collection, because it turned out that Felix rather liked them as decor.

“Thank you,” Felix said. “Really.”

Mittermeyer just smiled a little and took another sip of his drink. 

“How is mom doing?”

“Very well,” Mittermeyer said. “She’s unhappy that you haven’t made time to come and visit, out of your very busy schedule.”

“I am busy,” Felix protested. “You know I’m busy.”

“I do, which is why I come to your defense every time she huffs about it. But do make an effort when you get back, will you?”

“Of course,” Felix said. “I’m going to Heinessen, not, I don’t know, embarking on an expedition into the unknown.”

“I am well aware. Still, your mother would also like to wish you happy birthday with more than a phone call while you run between meetings.”

“She’s more than welcome to come see me here.”

Mittermeyer shook his head. “When you get back from your diplomatic journey, you will come to dinner with your mother and I. That is an order.”

“Yes, sir,” Felix said.

“The kaiser doesn’t anticipate any problems on your trip, does he?”

“No,” Felix said, his tone instantly switching to the much more businesslike and formal one he used when he was discussing work matters. “I don’t either, but I don’t believe we’ll make any real progress.”

“I have some thoughts, if you’d like to hear them,” Mittermeyer said.

“Of course, always,” Felix said.

Mittermeyer leaned forward a little, slipping back into his well familiar role of Supreme Fleet Commander, a position he had held for many years, and would until he retired. They spent some time discussing the issue at hand, which was that a new route coreward towards the next arm of the galaxy had been discovered, and the Heinessen Republic had begun significant exploration into the area, including a worrying amount of military presence through the new corridor. While this was not technically forbidden by any treaty or understanding, it was a move that showed teeth. Kaiser Alexander wanted to preemptively put a stop to it, with diplomacy first, and with a show of force later, if necessary. Mittermeyer talked over some of the key points with Felix, mainly what he saw would be the most credible kind of veiled threats to make, that he himself would feel were reasonable.

The discussion was productive, and he loved seeing this side of his son: competent, incisive, intelligent. It could have been like stepping back those thirty three years to have the same conversation with Reuenthal. It could have, but it wasn’t. Reuenthal never laughed so freely as Felix did, and he was more diplomatic than his father. And, of course, where Reuenthal had been Mittermeyer’s equal, Felix was his son, and so the negotiation of giving and taking advice was different. Still, it was so close, and he savored it.

Mittermeyer wondered if anything he said here would hold up when his son was actually on Heinessen, trying to be firm but friendly with the new crop of government officials they had over there. Greenhill-Yang had retired, which surprised Mittermeyer, since he had thought she was as much a fixture of the galaxy as he was, but perhaps she had her own plans for life that didn’t involve being in government for the rest of it. It was hard to keep track of some of the higher ups over there, since they rotated in and out with every election cycle. Stability, Mittermeyer felt, was the only thing that kept him around.

Felix reluctantly straightened up after a while, looking at the clock. “I have a lunch meeting,” he said, annoyance clear in his voice. “I shouldn’t make my staff wait on me.”

“Of course not,” Mittermeyer said. “I won’t hold you.” He smiled. “The prime minister wondered if I might come by the capitol for lunch anyway, so I shouldn’t disappoint her.” He stood, and Felix came around to the front of the desk. Mittermeyer grabbed his arm, squeezing it for a moment. “Are you too old and important for me to tell you that I’m proud of you?”

Felix laughed. “The door is closed, so I think I can forgive you, just this once.”

“Well, I am. Happy birthday. And have a safe trip.”

“I will. Will you come see the launch?”

“All the way up to the top of that elevator?” he asked. “You try my patience. But yes, of course.”

“Good. Alexander will be happy to have you there.” That was another thing that was different. To Mittermeyer, Kaiser Alexander was always that, or the kaiser. Kaiser Reinhard had been  _ Mein Kaiser _ , to both him and Reuenthal. But in casual company, for Felix, the kaiser was always just Alexander, delivered in that particular, funny tone he had. Mittermeyer had never asked or tried to find out what the exact nature of his son’s friendship with the kaiser was, and Felix had never offered. But it was clear that they were close.

“Will he?” Mittermeyer asked. “Glad to hear that I still have the kaiser’s favor.”

“I don’t think you could ever lose it, you know,” Felix said. “No matter what you measure loyalty in, I think you have more of it than anyone else. And he likes that, you know.”

“I would hope he keeps me around for more than just that reason,” Mittermeyer said. “There are plenty of very stupid, very loyal people in this world. If I stop being useful, you make sure to suggest to him that he should make me tender my resignation.”

“I wouldn’t do that to you.”

“Please,” Mittermeyer said, only half joking. “It would be a mercy.”

Felix laughed. “I really have to run. It was good to see you.”

“Of course. Any time. Unless you become too busy for me, too.”

“Never.”

“I won’t tell your mother that you said that.”

“Thanks.” He grinned, then held the door open. “Have a nice lunch.”

“I will.” They walked to the end of the hallway together, then split off in opposite directions, Felix at a jog, Mittermeyer at a more stately pace. He was still plenty spry at sixty-five, but there was no reason for him to run, so he walked, heading out of the Ministry of War and opting to stroll rather than drive to the capitol building.

It was a beautiful spring day on Phezzan, with a bright blue sky overhead that was completely at odds with Mittermeyer’s melancholy mood. The wind ruffled his hair, more white than blond now, and tugged at the bunched fabric shoulders of his uniform. 

He walked past the truly horrible statue of Kaiser Reinhard that had been erected at a street corner. Reinhard himself would have hated it for its ostentatiousness, and the way the statue, far larger than life, glared down at passers by as though they were bugs. Although Reinhard had often been imperious, the expression on the marble face here was so out of place from what Mittermeyer remembered that it rendered the whole countenance unfamiliar, even if the features were correct. The sculptor had clearly been drawing influence from the type of art that had proliferated of Rudolph the Great, no matter that Reinhard had hated the man. Or, perhaps Mittermeyer was wrong, and the kindness of memory had changed what he remembered Reinhard’s perfect, frozen youth to look like. 

He thought he could still call up those memories perfectly, though. It took no effort at all to imagine that Reinhard was walking ten paces in front of him, white cape flaring out with every stride, ready to turn around at any moment and say, with his confident, bright voice, “And another thing, Fleet Admiral Mittermeyer—“

Kircheis, too, he could summon from the grave, walking beside Reinhard, who might reach out and put a hand on his arm, or Kircheis might lean down to say some quiet words of advice in Reinhard’s ear..

And it was easy to imagine Lutz, Fahrenheit, Steinmetz… all the others he had known over the years. 

It was only Reuenthal he had difficulty recollecting, now. He could conjure him, but then he would realize that the man he was picturing was gesturing just like Eva did, and he would realize that this was Felix that he was imagining walking beside him. Reuenthal did not wrinkle his nose when he thought, did not swing his arms that loosely when he walked, did not ever smile wistfully at nothing in quiet moments like Felix did. Reuenthal was not a happy person. It was good, then, that Felix was.

It pained Mittermeyer that he couldn’t even have that ghost of invented memory for company, but perhaps it was for the best. He had Felix, who was real, and he tried to let that be enough. Perhaps as Felix grew older still, older than his father ever had, they would separate themselves in his mind again. To think that Mittermeyer would have a chance to watch Reuenthal grow old through Felix, without the pain of seeing him die again.

The memories of that time, the barely more than ten years that he had known Reuenthal, lived more strongly in his mind than the entire lifetime in between then and now. It had been a lifetime— he was crossing that temporal threshold, the one where Reuenthal had been dead for more years than he had been alive. It should have been a meaningless number to Mittermeyer— it wasn’t as though he had known Reuenthal in childhood— but it stuck regardless.

It is the duty of the son to outlive the father, indeed.

He turned down the final street towards the imposing capital building, and climbed the marble steps to the entrance, greeted respectfully by the guards. He knew his way around well, and arrived at the Prime Minister’s office just as the door opened, some minor politicians heading out, followed swiftly by the prime minister.

Hildegarde von Lohengramm was only ten years younger than he was, but she looked younger than that. Her hair was still all the way blond, and the undisguised wrinkles around her eyes gave her a distinguished look. She was dressed as she usually was, in a smart suit, and her whole face lit up when she saw Mittermeyer.

“So, you made room for me after all, Fleet Admiral,” she said.

“Of course,” Mittermeyer said. “I could hardly refuse.”

She laughed a little. “You certainly could refuse a purely social luncheon. Go home and see the lovely Frau Mittermeyer instead of myself.”

“I’ll report this flattery back to her.”

“Excellent,” Hilde said. “Walk with me?”

“Of course.”

They made their way away from the office itself and headed out to the back of the building, where there was a very formal flower garden, all in bloom, and a pavilion where a table with lunch had been set up for the two of them. It was quite private; the same technology that shielded the command chairs in ships was employed to keep eavesdropping to a minimum. 

“How have you been?” Mittermeyer asked.

“Since you last saw me? Which was about a week ago? Fine.” She smiled. “Please wish Admiral Mittermeyer a happy birthday for me, if you see him before he launches.”

“I just came from his office,” he replied. “You’re not coming to the launch?”

“Alex told me that my presence is not required. He doesn’t like me to go out of my way for him.”

“I see,” Mittermeyer said. “I’ll be there.”

“Oh, good,” she said. 

“I should have asked Felix this, but have they decided which ship the kaiser is going on?”

“The last I heard, he was going to be on the  _ Berlin _ , but since that’s changed about twelve times since this diplomatic mission was floated, so tomorrow could come and I’ll find out that Alex has changed his mind and does want to be on the  _ Galaxy’s Edge _ after all. I can’t worry about it too much.” The  _ Berlin _ was Felix’s flagship, while the  _ Galaxy’s Edge  _ was the ship reserved for Kaiser Alexander’s personal use.

“His father was never this changeable,” Mittermeyer said.

“No, he wasn’t. But, then again, he loved the  _ Brunhilde  _ more than he loved most people, so there wasn’t ever any doubt what ship he would take.”

“That’s true. How are you feeling about all of this?”

Hilde frowned a little. “Would you fault me for being apprehensive?”

“No, not at all.”

“I don’t like the new Heinessen leadership.”

“The nature of Heinessen leadership is that it’s always new,” Mittermeyer said.

“No, they had some long haulers with good sense. I like Greenhill-Yang. She has a good head on her shoulders.”

“She’s done the smart thing and retired.”

“She’s the same age as I am,” Hilde said. “Approximately, anyway. I have twenty good years in me yet, at least. Or until my son decides that it does actually look bad to have the former regent stay in a powerful position.”

“You don’t even call yourself Kaiserin anymore. I think prime minister is a post that suits you.”

“Smacks of nepotism, or worse, that I’m puppeting him, though.”

“I thought you had gotten tired of having this argument with yourself ten years ago.”

“Well, Alex has been—“ She stopped, sighed, and took a sip of her tea. “You do not deserve to be burdened with family problems.” This was her way of deciding that she didn’t want to discuss it. He nodded and waved his hand to signal that he wouldn’t pursue the topic.

“I’ve been wondering if I should retire,” Mittermeyer said.

Immediately, Hilde’s head jerked up. “No, you can’t,” she said, alarmed.

“I’m sixty-five. You can hardly call that a workhorse age anymore.”

“No, really, Mittermeyer, don’t. I won’t let Alex sign your resignation.”

“That’s cruel.”

She pursed her lips. “I just told you that I’m nervous. If there’s another war, as much as I like your son, I want you to be at the helm of it.”

“And if this all blows over into nothing?”

“Even if it’s nothing,” she said. “I still would like to have you around.”

“Why?”

“Do you even need me to answer that question?” She fiddled with some of the food on her plate, and in that moment of silence, Mittermeyer realized that he was hungry, and began to eat the sandwich that had been set out for him. Hilde waited strategically until he had his mouth full so that he couldn’t politely respond and interrupt her. “You’re the only one left. I can’t do… all of this… without knowing you’re in it with me, somewhere.”

“There are others. We’re not the last of our generation.”

“You know what I mean.” He did. The two of them had grown far closer over the years for precisely this reason. He had always liked and respected her, but they had a camaraderie born of being the sole survivors of Reinhard’s closest inner circle. “And, besides,” she said after a second, “do you really think that you’d be happy, being retired?”

“No,” Mittermeyer said. “But am I happy now?”

She narrowed her eyes at him. “Don’t make me worry about you.”

“Alright, alright. I get your point. I know you couldn’t stand your peaceful retirement.”

“I might have been happy if it hadn’t looked from where I was sitting like everything was falling apart without me.”

Mittermeyer shook his head. “I would trust my successor not to let the fleet fall into complete chaos.”

“You say that now, but— oh, you want to hear a metaphor that Annerose told me?”

“Always.”

“She described it like the front and back of an embroidery piece. The chaos looks a lot different when you’re at the front side, wielding the thread, and not at the back side, with all the threads going everywhere, watching it just get messier and messier.”

“Is this your way of saying that you think you stepped on the kaiser too hard when you took this role?”

She bit her lip, and Mittermeyer realized that he had broken his unspoken promise not to discuss it.

“All I’m saying is that not having my finger on the pulse of things makes me itch. My father used to say that I’ve been this way since I was a child.”

Mittermeyer laughed. “I can believe it.”

“I’ve been very lucky,” she said. “I would be unhappy in retirement.”

“One of us will have to stop working long enough to write our memoirs.”

She made a face. “Will you, really?”

“You don’t think I should?”

“I think everyone has already said everything about the past that could possibly be said.”

“No,” Mittermeyer said. “Not everything.”

She looked at him. “I said that could be said. Not everything can be.”

“You don’t want there to be a real record?”

She stared over his shoulder, watching a hummingbird stop at a flower briefly, then flit away. “Do you want there to be?”

“I don’t know,” Mittermeyer said. “Maybe.” He shook his head. “You can stop me. If you don’t want me to say anything, I won’t. I’ve said nothing for this long.”

“Why?” she asked.

“Maybe it would do some good.”

“I don’t see how it could. I think the image that people have is a good one.”

“People think of him almost like a god,” Mittermeyer said. “I know there was a time that I did. Maybe I still do. But all this time later?” He paused, rubbing his cheek. “I don’t know what I’m saying. Forgive me.”

“No, go on,” she said.

“I met him when he was what, eighteen? He didn’t even live to thirty. He was brilliant, that much is true, and I think I was caught up in that brilliance so much that I would try to forget that he was real. That he was a person that you could touch.”

“He was,” Hilde said. “He was very real.”

Mittermeyer nodded. “Knowing it all was real— at least it stops me from having to decide if it was a beautiful dream, or a nightmare.”

“It was both. At different times.”

Mittermeyer shook his head. “No. It was real, which is worse.”

She laughed a little. “Maybe.”

“But other people— I want them to know how real it was. That needs the truth, or none of it makes any sense.”

“It seems to make sense to them now.”

“I don’t know how.”

“Because they only see the dream, like you said. Things make sense in dreams. Things make sense when gods do them.”

“Do you think, if Kircheis—“

“It would all be different if Kircheis were alive. If Kircheis were alive, he would be alive, Reuenthal would be alive, they all would be,” she said. “But they’re not.”

“Just us.”

“Just us,” she agreed. After a moment, she said, “Writing down the truth won’t bring them back to life. Not for you, and not for anyone who reads it.”

“Maybe it would give me some peace of mind, though.”

“If that’s what you’re after…” Some of the tension left her shoulders. “I hope you find it, anyway.”

“I’ve never liked secrets.”

“You’ve been living the wrong life, then.”

“What other life could I have lived?”

“You don’t ever imagine the alternatives?”

“I try not to.”

“Yeah.” She finished her own sandwich. Her voice was steadier when she changed the topic. “How has Heinrich been?”

Mittermeyer smiled. “Good. He’s thinking of starting his own law firm, but Eva keeps telling him that he should make sure he’s very sure before he makes any big changes and burns professional bridges. You can’t be mad at me for wanting to retire, since he made the good choice to get out of the fleet, which makes him the only one in my family with any sense, I suppose.”

She shook her head. “If you didn’t have good sense, I wouldn’t talk to you nearly as much.”

He chuckled a little, and some of the melancholy that had been hanging over them vanished. Although this was a social visit, the topic drifted back to politics, as usual, and Hilde asked his thoughts on various things, which Mittermeyer answered to the best of his ability. 

When they finished lunch, they walked back through the garden together. At the door, unexpectedly, Hilde hugged Mittermeyer. He returned the embrace. She felt thinner than he remembered her being, or than she looked. 

“I think the truth only matters to people who lived it,” she said, very quietly. “Maybe we should let everybody else have their dreams.”

“You want to protect him.”

“That was always my job.” She released him and smiled, very wanly. “I didn’t do a very good job of it, though.”

“You did,” he insisted.

“Kind of you to say.” She paused for a second. “Don’t you want to protect…”

“I think Reuenthal is beyond protection,” Mittermeyer said. Privately, he thought that if things had been just a little different, Reuenthal and Reinhard both would have been in favor of the secret being revealed, the curtain torn back, some of the veil of the previous dynasty lifted even further. But maybe he was just deluding himself that that could ever be the case. “And I don’t need it.”

“What would Eva say if she heard you say that?”

“Nothing good, I’m sure,” Mittermeyer said. Hilde twitched and rubbed her eye a little. “You alright?” he asked.

“I have to go meet with what feels like the entire ministry of the interior,” she said. “And you’ve made me get all distracted.”

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“What will I tell them when I’m all out of sorts thinking about the past while they’re trying to tell me all about new colony planning?”

“Tell them it’s allergies, beautiful spring day, gave you a headache.”

“Very weak excuse.”

“Then you could always tell them the truth,” Mittermeyer said with a smile.

“I do have an allergy to certain kinds of grass, now that you mention it.”

**Author's Note:**

> i wrote this like 2 months ago and wasn’t sure if it was good enough to post, but what else am i going to do with it? let it rot in my google docs forever? lol
> 
> i love mittermeyer but god everything about him is so actively depressing, even though on the surface, he gets the thing that everyone else failed to: he lived, he had a happy family, etc. but...
> 
> in the early parts of wheel inside a wheel, i make mittermeyer and reuenthal (as commodores and rear admirals) have the flagships ostberlin and westberlin. felix’s flagship here is simply the berlin.
> 
> [title is from the mountain goats song Paid in Cocaine](%E2%80%9C)   
>  _all four of us still fresh and alive / flashes and phosphenes / hard to believe that’s me / strapped in, visibly sweating / happy as i’m ever gonna be / you’re by my side (you’re by my side) / five years left on your car / you’re cashing out / all dressed up / for your date with the emergency ward_
> 
> thank you to em for the beta read. i’m @javert on tumblr, @natsinator on twitter, and my original fiction is @ bit.ly/arcadispark and bit.ly/shadowofheaven .


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